10 Management Lessons from the U.S. Navy

Originally published: 12.01.09 by
Guy Kawasaki

Recently, I had the extraordinary experience of spending a day and a night at sea in the Pacific Ocean on board the USS Nimitz. I was part of a Navy outreach program to give ordinary landlubbers like me a perspective on the mission and operations of a naval strike group.

I was excited. Who would turn down a chance to get on top of a nuclear power plant driving 100,000 tons of steel through the ocean, with 5,000 men and women handling scores of aircraft, carrying thousands of pounds of bombs and missiles, burning thousands of gallons of jet fuel a day, with margins measured in inches, and tolerances of seconds?

What I discovered during my visit is that many of us who are working in non-military organizations, and who may not have given a second thought to the Navy as a model, would do well to understand how a small city floating on the ocean works. During about 30 hours of immersion with sailors and pilots (and public affairs officers), I realized there were several principles at work that make the Navy so successful — principles that are not at all unique to running an aircraft carrier — representing important

lessons for everyone interested in entrepreneurship, innovation, teamwork, and management:

1. Inspiration: Having a big, meaningful goal is a tremendous force for inspiration, motivation, and cohesion. The Navy’s mission is not some vague, abstract, feel-good paragraph in a business plan; it is very concrete, and very easy to understand and internalize. In addition to defending America, fighting terrorists, and rescuing victims of piracy, the Navy takes enormous pride in their role in helping the tsunami victims in 2004, and in helping the Katrina victims in 2005. While everyone I talked with had his or her own particular story, everyone had a distinct and powerful pride in what they had accomplished and in the people around them. Even in the best organizations, in my experience, such a core consistency of pride is extremely rare.

2. Perspiration: If everyone buys into the goal, you can get an amazing amount of work done, including regular 16-hour days with very low pay. The Nimitz does not offer a 9-to-5 workday. Some days, crews are on the flight deck for 14 or 16 hours, into the wee hours of the morning, inhaling noxious fumes and making sure every plane gets back safely. And then after the planes get back at midnight, the maintenance crew is still at work making sure the planes are ready for the next day. A maintenance chief told me that, given the age of the planes and the stress of carrier flying, it is typical that a plane requires 25 hours of maintenance for every hour of flight time. That seems inefficient, but the alternative is unacceptable. You don’t want to fly a plane that is anything less than 100% maintained.

3. Teamwork: As much as the movie “Top Gun” created the impression that it’s about competing to be No. 1, the ethic in an actual operating situation is intensely about team performance. Watching the crews maintain, fuel, setup, and pilot F-18s for flight, it’s clear it’s not about who’s the hottest dog on the deck. Every single person counts on other members of the team to enable them to get their part of the job done, and no one person can take credit for success, or benefit from another’s failure.

4. Recruiting and training: There is a common misperception that the military attracts the lower performers in our society who have no other choices. The Navy is very fortunate to have more people who want to join than there are available slots. But more important, the men and women who make it through training are astoundingly competent people. The lesson here is that it’s not about fancy degrees and prior polish; it’s about a commitment to excellence in each individual, and the willingness to work to exhaustion to make sure you live up to your commitment.

5. Accountability and continuous improvement: There is no contradiction between an intense ethic of teamwork and the need for individual accountability. In the Navy, everything is monitored and measured. Every system has to perform at 100%, and for every system there is a person responsible for making sure that happens. Every cycle of take-offs and landings is measured and scored. And every score is assessed to figure out a way to do it better.

6. Respect: In the Navy, if you don’t
like someone because of their race, or
creed, or whatever, you have the opportunity
to change your mind, because
that person may be living in the bunk 14
inches away from you. Respect isn’t just
an altruistic ethic; it’s a necessity. More
so than any other institution, the U.S.
military has been successful at integrating
America’s young men and women.
I’m sure the Navy is not perfect in this
regard, but when I looked around the
bridge and saw the incredibly diverse
team of men and women who were
calmly, confidently, and competently
running this multi-billion dollar acme
of American technological accomplishment,
I thought why can’t all of America
be more like this?

7. Overcoming fear: On a busy aircraft
carrier, there are a lot of things that
happen that are really scary, and people
die. Despite the macho prototype of the
Navy pilot, in private these pilots admit
that landing a jet on a moving carrier
at night is a downright terrifying experience.
Watching a series of jets land
at night, you get the impression that it
must be pretty easy, because they do it
so well. But it isn’t easy; and even with
years of practice and experience, it’s
nerve-wracking.

8. Work/Life balance: It’s hard to
imagine how people in the military handle
being away from their families for
months at a time, in environments that
are almost entirely work. It’s clear that
it is not easy for most. My impression
is that the Navy tries to ease the strain
by creating a work environment that is
much looser and more casual than we
expected. We thought the crew aboard
the ship would be much more heavily
starched than they were, and that the
interactions between subordinates and
superiors would be much stiffer. When
you are on the line, there is no slack, and
there is no room for anything less than
100%. But when there is a break in the
action, you can relax and be human.

9. Reverence and irreverence: The
week before our visit, the Nimitz lost five
crew in a helicopter accident. These were
not strangers; these were co-workers
and friends. Among the pilots, it seems
that everyone has at least one story of
a good friend who was lost. For these
men and women, death is all too real.
There are memorials around the ship
to remind everyone of those who have
given their lives in the service of their
country. At the same time, there is an irreverence
that pops up quite frequently,
sometimes when you wouldn’t expect it.
The captain, in welcoming us, referred
to the aircraft carrier as being “kind of
like a jail, except there’s the possibility of
drowning.” Not exactly what you would
expect to hear.

10. 100% performance: From moment
to moment, the operations on
board a nuclear aircraft carrier expose
the crew to an extraordinary degree of
danger. A simple mistake can result in
death, and much of what is being done
on the ship and in the air is not at all
simple. But they make it look simple.
We watched scores of planes take off
and land on a moving platform without
a hitch. The key is training, training,
training, and total focus and dedication
when you are on the line.

Not every entrepreneur wants to
model his or her organization and culture
on the Navy. For many entrepreneurs,
indeed, that is a very unappealing
concept, but that’s because they don’t
really understand what makes the Navy
one of the most effective organizations
on the planet. Like any other successful
organization, it’s about the people. The
key is harnessing the incredible potential
of every individual through inspiration,
training, and teamwork.

Guy Kawasaki is a managing director of
Garage Technology Ventures, an early-stage
venture capital firm and a columnist for
Forbes.com. Previously, he was an Apple
Fellow at Apple Computer Inc., where he was
one of the individuals responsible for the
success of the Macintosh computer. He is the
author of nine books, which can be found at
www.guykawasaki.com.

Articles by Guy Kawasaki

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